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Somehow in recent years, quiche lost its way. Its reputation was bruised. No doubt, it was partly due to an onslaught of weekend brunches with subpar crusts and watery fillings. Or maybe we went overboard on the catered affairs, with passed mini-quiches that were always cold and tasted like bitter mushrooms.
Perhaps quiche was served too often at too many ladies-who-lunch affairs in the '70s and '80s (there is in fact a best-selling book called Real Men Don't Eat Quiche, published in 1982. We'll resist the urge to delve further into the gender implications of quiche-eating).
Whatever the impetus, quiche has been heading for the same fate as sun-dried tomatoes, raspberry balsamic dressing, and cured salmon on pizza. Once popular, these dishes now live in our collective memories of a time now passed, and never to be repeated. But quiche deserves to be rescued. It doesn't deserve a bleak future. Quiche, when done correctly, is a beautiful thing.
Take our February cover recipe, the Caramelized Garlic, Spinach, and Cheddar Tart (pictured above). This is a quiche. It is called a tart, but it is a quiche (even our food director Carla Lalli Music admits it). Why? By definition, it contains a savory egg custard inside a pastry crust. And it's absolutely delicious. The recipe calls for both crème fraîche and heavy cream, which results in an extra luxurious custard when baked. To counteract the richness, a robust cheese like Cheddar, Gruyère, or feta helps to give quiche more depth of flavor, says digital food editor Dawn Perry.
And, take this Roasted Vegetable Tart, a cover recipe from October 2012. It is also a quiche even though it is called a tart (even our executive editor Christine Muhlke admits it). It's by cookbook hero Yotam Ottolenghi, so you know it's good. All the vegetables are roasted and seasoned separately, to ensure that the filling tastes bright. Like the caramelized garlic tart quiche, the crust is blind-baked so the dough takes on a crispy texture to contrast with the soft custard filling.
So, while this very magazine has perhaps been a bit timid to refer to recipes as "quiche," at least we can admit that quiche is tasty enough to be featured on the cover twice in three years.
Over at Slate, L.V. Anderson waxes poetic about the quiche from Arcade Bakery—a fine specimen, we agree. She claims, "Quiche filling should contain just enough eggs to prevent it from being soupy, but the eggs are (literally) a supporting player. It’s the butterfat in the cream and milk that is responsible for a good quiche’s disarmingly rich texture." We concur.
So let's review:
• A good quiche should have a lot of dairy and a decent amount of fat ("You cant make quiche with reduced-fat dairy," says Perry.) This is not diet food.
• Quiche should have a good homemade crust, preferably blind-baked.
• The fillings in quiche should typically be seasoned and cooked separately—onions should be sautéed and wet vegetables need to be cooked to the point of releasing their liquid (looking at you, mushrooms).
Not all quiche recipes follow these rules, though. Part of the reason that quiche is oft-maligned is that it's just not good (looking at you, cute brunch place that seems like it would have a good quiche but then it doesn't). The filling can be mushy. The crusts are frequently store-bought. The egg is often overcooked. The add-ins are typically underseasoned.
There are a lot of bad versions of great food, though the reputation of dishes like roast chicken and steak frites remain intact. Don't let all the bad quiches out there ruin the entire category. Let's not tarnish the genre just because of a few bad eggs (lame pun most definitely intended). We should just love quiche for what it is: a dairy-heavy meal with maybe at least one decent serving of vegetables. Oh, and cheese. That actually sounds like a dream dinner.
"If high-wasted jeans and full eyebrows can come back, so can quiche," says Music. Amen.